Part 2 — CHAPTER IV. Concerning the infallible teaching of the Roman Pontiff: (continued 17)

V. Duruy, History of Rome, chapters 77-78 (volume 4).

ALSO IN: Suetonius, Lives of the Twelve Cæsars: Vespasian, Titus, Domitian.

C. Merivale, History of the Romans under the Empire, chapters 57-60 (volumes 6-7).

{2711}

ROME: A. D. 78-84. Campaigns of Agricola in Britain.

See BRITAIN: A. D. 78-84.

ROME: A. D. 96-138. Brief reign of Nerva.- Adoption and succession of Trajan. His persecution of Christians. His conquests beyond the Danube and in the east. Hadrian's relinquishment of them.

"On the same day on which Domitian was assassinated, M. Cocceius Nerva was proclaimed Emperor by the Prætorians, and confirmed by the people. He owed his elevation principally to Petronius, Prefect of the Prætorians, and Parthenius, chamberlain to the late Emperor. He was of Cretan origin, and a native of Narni in Umbria, and consequently the first Emperor who was not of Italian descent. … He was prudent, upright, generous, and of a gentle temper; but a feeble frame and weak constitution, added to the burden of 64 years, rendered him too reserved, timid, and irresolute for the arduous duties of a sovereign prince. … The tolerant and reforming administration of the new Emperor soon became popular. Rome breathed again after the bloody tyranny under which she had been trampled to the dust. The perjured 'delator' was threatened with the severest penalties. The treacherous slave who had denounced his master was put to death. Exiles returned to their native cities, and again enjoyed their confiscated possessions. … Determined to administer the government for the benefit of the Roman people, he (Nerva) turned his attention to the question of finance, and to the burdensome taxation which was the fruit of the extravagance of his predecessors. … He diminished the enormous sums which were lavished upon shows and spectacles, and reduced, as far as was possible, his personal and household expenses. … It was not probable that an Emperor of so weak and yielding a character, notwithstanding his good qualities as a prince and a statesman, would be acceptable to a licentious and dominant soldiery. But a few months had elapsed when a conspiracy was organized against him by Calpurnius Crassus. It was, however, discovered; and the ringleader, having confessed his crime, experienced the Emperor's usual generosity, being only punished by banishment to Tarentum. … Meanwhile the Prætorians, led on by Ælianus Carperius, who had been their Prefect under Domitian, besieged Nerva in his palace, with cries of vengeance upon the assassins of his predecessor, murdered Petronius and Parthenius, and compelled the timid Emperor publicly to express his approbation of the deed, and to testify his obligation to them for wreaking vengeance on the guilty. … Nerva was in declining years, and, taught by circumstances that he was unequal to curb or cope with the insolence of the soldiery, adopted Trojan as his son and successor [A. D. 97]. Soon after, he conferred upon him in the Senate the rank of Cæsar, and the name of Germanicus, and added the tribuneship and the title of Emperor. This act calmed the tumult, and was welcomed with the unanimous consent of the Senate and the people. … Soon after the adoption of Trajan he died of a fit of ague which brought on fever, at the gardens of Sallust, after a reign of sixteen months, in the sixty-sixth year of his age [A. D. 98]. … The choice which Nerva had made proved a fortunate one. M. Ulpius Nerva Trajanus was a Spaniard, a native of Italica, near Seville. … He was of an ancient and distinguished family, and his father had filled the office of consul. Although a foreigner, he was a Roman in habits, sympathies, and language; for the south of Spain had become so completely Roman that the inhabitants generally spoke Latin. When a young man he had distinguished himself in a war against the Parthians. … At the time of his adoption by Nerva he was in command of a powerful army in Lower Germany, his head-quarters being at Cologne. He was in the prime of life, possessed of a robust constitution, a commanding figure, and a majestic countenance. He was a perfect soldier, by taste and education, and was endowed with all the qualities of a general. … He was a strict disciplinarian, but he knew all his veterans, spoke to them by their names, and never let a gallant action pass unrewarded. … The news of Nerva's death was conveyed to him at Cologne by his cousin Hadrian, where he immediately received the imperial power. During the first year of his reign he remained with the army in Germany, engaged in establishing the discipline of the troops and in inspiring them with a love of their duty. … The ensuing year he made his entry into Rome on foot, together with his empress, Pompeia Plotina, whose amiability and estimable character contributed much to the popularity of her husband. Her conduct, together with that of his sister, Marciana, exercised a most beneficial influence upon Roman society. They were the first ladies of the imperial court who by their example checked the shameless licentiousness which had long prevailed amongst women of the higher classes. … The tastes and habits of his former life led to a change in the peaceful policy which had so long prevailed. The first war in which he was engaged was with the Dacians, who inhabited the country beyond the Danube. …

See DACIA: A. D. 102-106.

A few years of peace ensued, which Trajan endured with patient reluctance; and many great public works undertaken during the interval show his genius for civil as well as for military administration. … But his presence was soon required in the East, and he joyfully hailed the opportunity thus offered him for gaining fresh laurels. The real object of this expedition was ambition—the pretext, that Exedarius, or Exodares, king of Armenia, had received the crown from the king of Parthia, instead of from the Emperor of Rome, as Tiridates had from the hands of Nero. For this insult he demanded satisfaction. Chosroes, the king of Parthia, at first treated his message with contempt; but afterwards, seeing that war was imminent, he sent ambassadors with presents to meet Trajan at Athens, and to announce to him the deposition of Exedarius, and to entreat him to confer the crown of Armenia upon Parthamasiris, or Parthamaspes. Trajan received the ambassadors coldly, told them that he was on his march to Syria, and would there act as he thought fit. Accordingly he crossed into Asia, and marched by way of Cilicia, Syria, and Seleucia to Antioch. {2712} The condemnation of the martyr bishop St. Ignatius marked his stay in that city [A. D. 115]. It seems strange that the persecution of the Christians should have met with countenance and support from an emperor like Trajan; but the fact is, the Roman mind could not separate the Christian from the Jew. The religious distinction was beneath their notice; they contemplated the former merely as a sect of the latter. The Roman party in Asia were persuaded that the Jews were meditating and preparing for insurrection; and the rebellions of this and the ensuing reign proved that their apprehensions were not unreasonable. Hence, at Antioch, the imperial influence was on the side of persecution; and hence when Pliny, the gentle governor of Pontus and Bithynia, wrote to Trajan for instructions respecting the Christians in his province, his 'rescript' spoke of Christianity as a dangerous superstition, and enjoined the punishment of its professors if discovered, although he would not have them sought for. Having received the voluntary sub·mission of Abgarns, prince of Osrhoene in Mesopotamia, he marched against Armenia. Parthamasiris, who had assumed the royal state, laid his diadem at his feet, in the hopes that he would return it to him as Nero had to Tiridates. Trajan claimed his kingdom as a province of the Roman people, and the unfortunate monarch lost his life in a useless struggle for his crown. This was the commencement of his triumphs: he received the voluntary submission of the kings of Iberia, Sarmatia, the Bosphorus, Colchis, Albania; and he assigned kings to most of the barbarous tribes that inhabited the coast of the Euxine. Still he proceeded on his career of conquest. He chastised the king of Adiabene, who had behaved to him with treachery, and took possession of his dominions, subjugated the rest of Mesopotamia, constructed a bridge of boats over the Tigris, and commenced a canal to unite the two great rivers of Assyria. His course of conquest was resistless; he captured Seleucia, earned the title of Parthicus by taking Ctesiphon, the capital of Parthia [A. D. 116], imposed a tribute on Mesopotamia, and reduced Assyria to the condition of a Roman province. He returned to winter at Antioch, which was in the same winter almost destroyed by an earthquake. Trajan escaped through a window, not without personal injury. … The river Tigris bore the victorious Emperor from the scene of his conquest down to the Persian Gulf; he subjugated Arabia Felix, and, like a second Alexander, was meditating and even making preparations for an invasion of India by sea; but his ambitious designs were frustrated by troubles nearer at hand. Some of the conquered nations revolted, and his garrisons were either expelled or put to the sword. He sent his generals to crush the rebels; one of them, Maximus, was conquered and slain; the other, Lusius Quietus, gained considerable advantages and was made governor of Palestine, which had begun to be in a state of insurrection.

See JEWS: A. D. 116.

He himself marched to punish the revolted Hagareni (Saracens), whose city was called Atra, in Mesopotamia. … Trajan laid siege to it, but was obliged to raise the siege with great loss. Soon after this he was seized with illness. … Leaving his army therefore to the care of Hadrian, whom he had made governor of Syria, he embarked for Rome at the earnest solicitation of the Senate. On arriving at Selinus in Cilicia (afterwards named Trajanopolis), he was seized with diarrhœa, and expired in the twentieth year of his reign [August, A. D. 117]. … He died childless, and it is said had not intended to nominate a successor, following in this the example of Alexander. Hadrian owed his adoption to Plotina. … Dio positively asserts that she concealed her husband's death for some days, and that the letter informing the Senate of his last intentions was signed by her, and not by Trajan. Hadrian received the despatches declaring his adoption on the 9th of August, and those announcing Trajan's death two days afterwards. … As soon as he was proclaimed Emperor at Antioch, he sent an apologetic despatch to the Senate requesting their assent to his election; the army, he said, had chosen him without waiting for their sanction, lest the Republic should remain without a prince. The confirmation which he asked for was immediately granted. … The state of Roman affairs was at this moment a very critical one, and did not permit the new Emperor to leave the East. Emboldened by the news of Trajan's illness, the conquered Parthians had revolted and achieved some great successes; Sarmatia on the north, Mauritania, Egypt, and Syria on the south, were already in a state of insurrection. The far-sighted prudence of Hadrian led him to fear that the empire was not unlikely to fall to pieces by its own weight, and that the Euphrates was its best boundary. It was doubtless a great sacrifice to surrender all the rich and populous provinces beyond that river which had been gained by the arms of his predecessor. It was no coward fear or mean envy of Trajan which prompted Hadrian, but he wisely felt that it was worth any price to purchase peace and security. Accordingly he withdrew the Roman armies from Armenia, Assyria and Mesopotamia, constituted the former of these an independent kingdom, surrendered the two latter to the Parthians, and restored their deposed king Chosroes to his throne. … After taking these measures for establishing peace in the East, he left Catilius Severus governor of Syria, and returned by way of Illyria to Rome, where he arrived the following year. … A restless curiosity, which was one of the principal features in his character, would not permit him to remain inactive at Rome; he determined to make a personal survey of every province throughout his vast dominions, and for this reason he is so frequently represented on medals as the Roman Hercules. He commenced his travels with Gaul, thence he proceeded to Germany, where he established order and discipline amongst the Roman forces, and then crossed over to Britain. … It would be uninteresting to give a mere catalogue of the countries which he visited during the ensuing ten years of his reign. In the fifteenth winter of it he arrived in Egypt, and rebuilt the tomb of Pompey the Great at Pelusium. Thence he proceeded to Alexandria which was at that period the university of the world. … He had scarcely passed through Syria when the Jews revolted, and continued in arms for three years. …

See JEWS: A. D. 130-134.

{2713}

Hadrian spent the winter at Athens, where he gratified his architectural taste by completing the temple of Jupiter Olympius. … Conscious … of the infirmities of disease and of advancing years, he adopted L. Aurelius Verus, a man of pleasure and of weak and delicate health, totally unfit for his new position. … Age and disease had now so altered his [Hadrian's] character that he became luxurious, self-indulgent, suspicious, and even cruel: Verus did not live two years, and the Emperor then adopted Titus Antoninus, on condition that he should in his turn adopt M. Annius Verus, afterwards called M. Aurelius, and the son of Aurelius Verus." Hadrian's malady "now became insupportably painful, his temper savage even to madness, and many lives of senators and others were sacrificed to his fury. His sufferings were so excruciating that he was always begging his attendants to put him to death. At last he went to Baiæ, where, setting at defiance the prescriptions of his physicians, he ate and drank what he pleased. Death, therefore, soon put a period to his sufferings, in the sixty-third year of his age and the twenty-first of his restless reign [A. D. 138]. Antoninus was present at his death, his corpse was burnt at Puteoli (Pozzuoli), and his ashes deposited in the mausoleum (moles Hadriani) which he had himself built, and which is now the Castle of St. Angelo."

R. W. Browne, History of Rome from A. D. 96, chapters 1-2.

ALSO IN: C. Merivale, History of the Romans under the Empire, chapters 63-66 (volume 7).

T. Arnold and others, History of the Roman Empire (Encyclopædia Metropolitana). chapters 4-6.

[IMAGE: THE ROMAN EMPIRE AT ITS GREATEST EXTENT UNDER TRAJAN (116) SHOWING ACQUISITIONS OF TERRITORY FROM THE ACCESSION OR AUGUSTUS. ROMAN TERRITORY AT THE ACCESSION OF AUGUSTUS. TERRITORY ACQUIRED TO THE ACCESSION or TRAJAN.

THE TEMPORARY CONQUESTS OF TRAJAN ARE SHOWN BY THE BORDER COLOR.

THE ACQUISITIONS OF THE DIFFERENT EMPERORS ARE INDICATED BY THE LETTERING.]

ROME: A. D. 138-180. The Antonines. Antoninus Pius. Marcus Aurelius.

"On the death of Hadrian in A. D. 138, Antoninus Pius succeeded to the throne, and, in accordance with the late Emperor's conditions, adopted Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Commodus. Marcus had been betrothed at the age of 15 to the sister of Lucius Commodus, but the new Emperor broke off the engagement, and betrothed him instead to his daughter Faustina. The marriage, however, was not celebrated till seven years afterwards, A. D. 146. The long reign of Antoninus Pius is one of those happy periods that have no history. An almost unbroken peace reigned at home and abroad. Taxes were lightened, calamities relieved, informers discouraged; confiscations were rare, plots and executions were almost unknown. Throughout the whole extent of his vast domain the people loved and valued their Emperor, and the Emperor's one aim was to further the happiness of his people. He, too, like Aurelius, had learnt that what was good for the bee was good for the hive. … He disliked war, did not value the military title of Imperator, and never deigned to accept a triumph. With this wise and eminent prince, who was as amiable in his private relations as he was admirable in the discharge of his public duties, Marcus Aurelius spent the next 23 years of his life. … There was not a shade of jealousy between them; each was the friend and adviser of the other, and, so far from regarding his destined heir with suspicion, the Emperor gave him the designation 'Cæsar,' and heaped upon him all the honours of the Roman commonwealth. It was in vain that the whisper of malignant tongues attempted to shake this mutual confidence. … In the year 161, when Marcus was now 40 years old. Antoninus Pius, who had reached the age of 75, caught a fever at Lorium. Feeling that his end was near, he summoned his friends and the chief men of Rome to his bedside, and there (without saying a word about his other adopted son, who is generally known by the name of Lucius Verus) solemnly recommended Marcus to them as his successor; and then, giving to the captain of the guard the watchword of 'Equanimity,' as though his earthly task was over he ordered to be transferred to the bedroom of Marcus the little golden statue of Fortune, which was kept in the private chamber of the Emperors as an omen of public prosperity. The very first act of the new Emperor was one of splendid generosity, namely, the admission of his adoptive brother Lucius Verus into the fullest participation of imperial honours. … The admission of Lucius Verus to a share of the Empire was due to the innate modesty of Marcus. As he was a devoted student, and cared less for manly exercises, in which Verus excelled, he thought that his adoptive brother would be a better and more useful general than himself, and that he could best serve the State by retaining the civil administration, and entrusting to his brother the management of war. Verus, however, as soon as he got away from the immediate influence and ennobling society of Marcus, broke loose from all decency, and showed himself to be a weak and worthless personage. … Two things only can be said in his favour; the one, that, though depraved, he was wholly free from cruelty; and the other, that he had the good sense to submit himself entirely to his brother. … Marcus had a large family by Faustina, and in the first year of his reign his wife bore twins, of whom the one who survived became the wicked and detested Emperor Commodus. As though the birth of such a child were in itself an omen of ruin, a storm of calamity began at once to burst over the long tranquil State. An inundation of the Tiber … caused a distress which ended in wide-spread famine. Men's minds were terrified by earthquakes, by the burning of cities, and by plagues of noxious insects. To these miseries, which the Emperors did their best to alleviate, was added the horror of wars and rumours of wars. The Parthians, under their king Vologeses, defeated and all but destroyed a Roman army, and devastated with impunity the Roman province of Syria. The wild tribes of the Catti burst over Germany with fire and sword; and the news from Britain was full of insurrection and tumult. Such were the elements of trouble and discord which overshadowed the reign of Marcus Aurelius from its very beginning down to its weary close. As the Parthian war was the most important of the three, Verus was sent to quell it, and but for the ability of his generals—the greatest of whom was Avidius Cassius—would have ruined irretrievably the fortunes of the Empire. These generals, however, vindicated the majesty of the Roman name [A. D. 165-166 —see PARTHIA], and Verus returned in triumph, bringing back with him from the East the seeds, of a terrible pestilence which devastated the whole Empire [see PLAGUE: A. D. 78-266] and by which, on the outbreak of fresh wars, Verus himself was carried off at Aquileia. … Marcus was now the undisputed lord of the Roman world. … But this imperial elevation kindled no glow of pride or self-satisfaction in his meek and chastened nature. He regarded himself as being in fact the servant of all. … He was one of those who held that nothing should be done hastily, and that few crimes were worse than the waste of time. {2714} It is to such views and such habits that we owe the composition of his works. His 'Meditations' were written amid the painful self-denial and distracting anxieties of his wars with the Quadi and the Marcomanni [A. D. 168-180,—see SARMATIAN AND MARCOMANNIAN WARS OF MARCUS AURELIUS], and he was the author of other works which unhappily have perished. Perhaps of all the lost treasures of antiquity there are few which we should feel a greater wish to recover than the lost autobiography of this wisest of Emperors and holiest of Pagan men. … The Court was to Marcus a burden; he tells us himself that Philosophy was his mother, Empire only his stepmother; it was only his repose in the one that rendered even tolerable to him the burdens of the other. … The most celebrated event of the war [with the Quadi] took place in a great victory … which he won in A. D. 174, and which was attributed by the Christians to what is known as the 'Miracle of the Thundering Legion.' …

See THUNDERING LEGION.

To the gentle heart of Marcus all war, even when accompanied with victories, was eminently distasteful; and in such painful and ungenial occupations no small part of his life was passed. … It was his unhappy destiny not to have trodden out the embers of this [the Sarmatian] war before he was burdened with another far more painful and formidable. This was the revolt of Avidius Cassius, a general of the old blunt Roman type, whom, in spite of some ominous warnings, Marcus both loved and trusted. The ingratitude displayed by such a man caused Marcus the deepest anguish; but he was saved from all dangerous consequences by the wide-spread affection which he had inspired by his virtuous reign. The very soldiers of the rebellious general fell away from him, and, after he had been a nominal Emperor for only three months and six days, he was assassinated by some of his own officers. … Marcus travelled through the provinces which had favoured the cause of Avidius Cassius, and treated them all with the most complete and indulgent forbearance. … During this journey of pacification, he lost his wife Faustina, who died suddenly in one of the valleys of Mount Taurus. History … has assigned to Faustina a character of the darkest infamy, and it has even been made a charge against Aurelius that he overlooked or condoned her offences. … No doubt Faustina was unworthy of her husband; but surely it is the glory and not the shame of a noble nature to be averse from jealousy and suspicion. … 'Marcus Aurelius cruelly persecuted the Christians.' Let us briefly consider this charge. … Marcus in his 'Meditations' alludes to the Christians once only, and then it is to make a passing complaint of the indifference to death, which appeared to him, as it appeared to Epictetus, to arise, not from any noble principles, but from mere obstinacy and perversity. That he shared the profound dislike with which Christians were regarded is very probable. That he was a cold-blooded and virulent persecutor is utterly unlike his whole character. … The true state of the case seems to have been this: The deep calamities in which during the whole reign of Marcus the Empire was involved, caused wide-spread distress, and roused into peculiar fury the feelings of the provincials against men whose atheism (for such they considered it to be) had kindled the anger of the gods. … Marcus, when appealed to, simply let the existing law take its course. … The martyrdoms took place in Gaul and Asia Minor, not in Rome. … The persecution of the churches in Lyons and Vienne happened in A. D. 177. Shortly after this period fresh wars recalled the Emperor to the North. … He was worn out with the toils, trials and travels of his long and weary life. He sunk under mental anxieties and bodily fatigues, and after a brief illness died in Pannonia, either at Vienna or at Sirmium, on March 17, A. D. 180, in the 59th year of his age and the 20th of his reign."

F. W. Farrar, Seekers after God: Marcus Aurelius.

"One moment, thanks to him, the world was governed by the best and greatest man of his age. Frightful decadences followed; but the little casket which contained the 'Thoughts' on the banks of the Granicus was saved. From it came forth that incomparable book in which Epictetus was surpassed, that Evangel of those who believe not in the supernatural, which has not been comprehended until our day. Veritable, eternal Evangel, the book of 'Thoughts,' which will never grow old, because it asserts no dogma."

E. Renan, English Conferences: Marcus Aurelius.

ALSO IN: W. W. Capes, The Age of the Antonines.

C. Merivale, History of the Romans under the Empire, chapters 67-68 (volume 7).

P. B. Watson, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus.

G. Long, Thoughts of the Emperor M. Aurelius Antoninus, introduction.

ROME: A. D. 180-192. The reign of Commodus.

"If a man were called to fix the period in the history of the world during which the condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession of Commodus. The vast extent of the Roman empire was governed by absolute power, under the guidance of virtue and wisdom. The armies were restrained by the firm but gentle hand of four successive emperors whose characters and authority commanded involuntary respect. … It has been objected to Marcus, that he sacrificed the happiness of millions to a fond partiality for a worthless boy; and that he chose a successor in his own family rather than in the republic. Nothing, however, was neglected by the anxious father, and by the men of virtue and learning whom he summoned to his assistance, to expand the narrow mind of young Commodus, to correct his growing vices, and to render him worthy of the throne for which he was designed. … The beloved son of Marcus succeeded to his father, amidst the acclamations of the senate and armies; and when he ascended the throne, the happy youth saw round him neither competitor to remove, nor enemies to punish. In this calm elevated station it was surely natural that he should prefer the love of mankind to their detestation, the mild glories of his five predecessors to the ignominious fate of Nero and Domitian. Yet Commodus was not, as he has been represented, a tiger born with an insatiate thirst of human blood, and capable, from his infancy, of the most inhuman actions. Nature had formed him of a weak, rather than a wicked disposition. His simplicity and timidity rendered him the slave of his attendants, who gradually corrupted his mind. His cruelty, which at first obeyed the dictates of others, degenerated into habit, and at length became the ruling passion of his soul. … {2715} During the three first years of his reign, the forms, and even the spirit, of the old administration were maintained by those faithful counsellors to whom Marcus had recommended his son, and for whose wisdom and integrity Commodus still entertained a reluctant esteem. The young prince and his profligate favorites revelled in all the license of sovereign power; but his hands were yet unstained with blood; and he had even displayed a generosity of sentiment, which might perhaps have ripened into solid virtue. A fatal incident decided his fluctuating character. One evening, as the emperor was returning to the palace through a dark and narrow portico in the amphitheatre, an assassin, who waited his passage, rushed upon him with a drawn sword, loudly exclaiming, 'The senate sends you this.' The menace prevented the deed; the assassin was seized by the guards, and immediately revealed the authors of the conspiracy. It had been formed, not in the State, but within the walls of the palace. … But the words of the assassin sunk deep into the mind of Commodus, and left an indelible impression of fear and hatred against the whole body of the senate. Those whom he had dreaded as importunate ministers he now suspected as secret enemies. The Delators, a race of men discouraged, and almost extinguished, under the former reigns, again became formidable as soon as they discovered that the emperor was desirous of finding disaffection and treason in the senate. … Suspicion was equivalent to proof; trial to condemnation. The execution of a considerable senator was attended with the death of all who might lament or revenge his fate; and when Commodus had once tasted human blood, he became incapable of pity or remorse. … Pestilence and famine contributed to fill up the measure of the calamities of Rome. … His cruelty proved at last fatal to himself. He had shed with impunity the noblest blood of Rome: he perished as soon as he was dreaded by his own domestics. Marcia, his favorite concubine, Eclectus, his chamberlain, and Lætus, his Prætorian præfect, alarmed by the fate of their companions and predecessors, resolved to prevent the destruction which every hour hung over their heads, either from the mad caprice of the tyrant, or the sudden indignation of the people. Marcia seized the occasion of presenting a draught of wine to her lover, after he had fatigued himself with hunting some wild beasts. Commodus retired to sleep; but whilst he was laboring with the effects of poison and drunkenness, a robust youth, by profession a wrestler, entered his chamber, and strangled him without resistance" (December 31, A. D. 192).

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapters 3-4.

ALSO IN: J. B. L. Crevier, History of the Roman Emperors, book 21 (volume 7).

ROME: A. D. 192-284. From Commodus to Diocletian. Twenty-three Emperors in the Century. Thirteen murdered by their own soldiers or servants. Successful wars of Severus, Aurelian, and Probus.

On the murder of Commodus, "Helvius Pertinax, the prefect of the city, a man of virtue, was placed on the throne by the conspirators, who would fain justify their deed in the eyes of the world, and their choice was confirmed by the senate. But the Prætorians had not forgotten their own power on a similar occasion; and they liked not the virtue and regularity of the new monarch. Pertinax was, therefore, speedily deprived of throne and life. Prætorian insolence now attained its height. Regardless of the dignity and honour of the empire, they set it up to auction. The highest bidder was a senator, named Didius Julianus [March, 193]. … The legions disdained to receive an emperor from the life-guards. Those of Britain proclaimed their general Clodius Albinus; those of Asia, Pescennius Niger: the Pannonian legions, Septimius Severus. This last was a man of bravery and conduct: by valour and stratagem he successively vanquished his rivals [defeating Albinus in an obstinate battle at Lyons, A. D: 197, and finishing the subjugation of his rivals in the east by reducing Byzantium after a siege of three years]. He maintained the superiority of the Roman arms against the Parthians and Caledonians.

See Britain; A. D. 208-211].

His reign was vigorous and advantageous to the state; but he wanted either the courage or the power to fully repress the license and insubordination of the soldiery. Severus left the empire [A. D. 211] to his two sons. Caracalla, the elder, a prince of violent and untamable passions, disdained to share empire with any. He murdered his brother and colleague, the more gentle Geta, and put to death all who ventured to disapprove of the deed. A restless ferocity distinguished the character of Caracalla; he was ever at war, now on the banks of the Rhine, now on those of the Euphrates. His martial impetuosity daunted his enemies; his reckless cruelty terrified his subjects. … During a Parthian war Caracalla gave offence to Macrinus, the commander of his body-guard, who murdered him [A. D. 217). Macrinus seized the empire, but had not power to hold it. He and his son Diadumenianus [after defeat in battle at Immæ, near Antioch] … were put to death by the army, who proclaimed a supposed son [and actually a second cousin] of their beloved Caracalla. This youth was named Elagabalus, and was priest of the Sun in the temple of Emesa, in Syria. Every vice stained the character of this licentious effeminate youth, whose name is become proverbial for sensual indulgence: he possessed no redeeming quality, had no friend, and was put to death by his own guards, who, vicious as they were themselves, detested vice in him. Alexander Severus, cousin to Elagabalus, but of a totally opposite character, succeeded that vicious prince [A. D. 222]. All estimable qualities were united in the noble and accomplished Alexander. … The love of learning and virtue did not in him smother military skill and valour; he checked the martial hordes of Germany, and led the Roman eagles to victory against the Sassanides, who had displaced the Arsacides in the dominion over Persia, and revived the claims of the house of Cyrus over Anterior Asia. Alexander, victorious in war, beloved by his subjects, deemed he might venture on introducing more regular discipline into the army. The attempt was fatal, and the amiable monarch lost his life in the mutiny that resulted [A. D. 235]. Maximin, a soldier, originally a Thracian shepherd, distinguished by his prodigious size, strength and appetite, a stranger to all civic virtues and all civic rules, rude, brutal, cruel, and ferocious, seated himself on the throne of the noble and virtuous prince, in whose murder he had been the chief agent. At Rome, the senate conferred the vacant dignity on Gordian, a noble, wealthy and virtuous senator, and on his son of the same name, a valiant and spirited youth. {2716} But scarcely were they recognized when the son fell in an engagement, and the father slew himself [A. D. 237]. Maximin was now rapidly marching towards Rome, full of rage and fury. Despair gave courage to the senate; they nominated Balbinus and Pupienus [Maximus Pupienus], one to direct the internal, the other the external affairs. Maximin had advanced as far as Aquileia [which he besieged without success], when his horrible cruelties caused an insurrection against him, and he and his son, an amiable youth, were murdered [A. D. 238]. The army was not, however, willing to acquiesce in the claim of the senate to appoint an emperor. Civil war was on the point of breaking out [and Balbinus and Pupienus were massacred by the Prætorians], when the conflicting parties agreed in the person of the third Gordian, a boy of but thirteen years of age [A. D. 238]. Gordian III. was … chiefly guided by his father-in-law, Misitheus, who induced him to engage in war against the Persians. In the war, Gordian displayed a courage worthy of any of his predecessors; but he shared what was now become the usual fate of a Roman emperor. He was murdered by Philip, the captain of his guard [A. D. 244]. Philip, an Arabian by birth, originally a captain of freebooters, seized on the purple of his murdered sovereign. Two rivals arose and contended with him for the prize, but accomplished nothing. A third competitor, Decius, the commander of the army of the Danube, defeated and slew him near Verona [A. D. 249]. During the reign of Philip, Rome attained her thousandth year."

T. Keightley, Outlines of History (Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopœdia), part 1, chapter 9.

"Decius is memorable as the first emperor who attempted to extirpate the Christian religion by a general persecution of its professors. His edicts are lost; but the records of the time exhibit a departure from the system which had been usually observed by enemies of the church since the days of Trajan. The authorities now sought out Christians; the legal order as to accusations was neglected; accusers ran no risk; and popular clamour was admitted instead of formal information. The long enjoyment of peace had told unfavourably on the church. … When, as Origen had foretold, a new season of trial came, the effects of the general relaxation were sadly displayed. On being summoned, in obedience to the emperor's edict, to appear and offer sacrifice, multitudes of Christians in every city rushed to the forum. … It seemed, says St. Cyprian, as if they had long been eager to find an opportunity for disowning their faith. The persecution was especially directed against the bishops and clergy. Among its victims were Fabian of Rome, Babylas of Antioch, and Alexander of Jerusalem; while in the lines of other eminent men (as Cyprian, Origen, Gregory Thaumaturgus, and Dionysius of Alexandria) the period is marked by exile or other sufferings. The chief object, however, was not to inflict death on the Christians, but to force them to recantation. With this view they were subjected to tortures, imprisonment and want of food; and under such trials the constancy of many gave way. Many withdrew into voluntary banishment; among these was Paul, a young man of Alexandria, who took up his abode in the desert of the Thebaid, and is celebrated as the first Christian hermit."

J. C. Robertson, History of the Christian Church, book 1, chapter 6 (volume 1).

"This persecution [of Decius] was interrupted by an invasion of the Goths, who, for the first time, crossed the Danube in considerable numbers, and devastated Mœsia.

See GOTHS: A. D. 244-251.

Decius marched against them, and gained some important advantages; but in his last battle, charging into the midst of the enemy to avenge the death of his son, he was overpowered and slain (A. D. 251). A great number of the Romans, thus deprived of their leader, fell victims to the barbarians; the survivors, grateful for the protection afforded them by the legions of Gallus, who commanded in the neighbourhood, proclaimed that general emperor. Gallus concluded a dishonourable peace with the Goths, and renewed the persecutions of the Christians. His dastardly conduct provoked general resentment; the provincial armies revolted, but the most dangerous insurrection was that headed by Æmilianus, who was proclaimed emperor in Mœsia. He led his forces into Italy, and the hostile armies met at Interamna (Terni); but just as an engagement was about to commence, Gallus was murdered by his own soldiers (A. D. 253), and Æmilianus proclaimed emperor. In three months Æmilianus himself met a similar fate, the army having chosen Valerian, the governor of Gaul, to the sovereignty. Valerian, though now sixty years of age, possessed powers that might have revived the sinking fortunes of the empire, which was now invaded on all sides. The Goths, who had formed a powerful monarchy on the lower Danube and the northern coasts of the Black Sea, extended their territories to the Borysthenes (Dneiper) and Tanais (Don): they ravaged Mœsia, Thrace and Macedon; while their fleets … devastated the coasts both of the European and Asiatic provinces.

See GOTHS: A. D. 258-267.

The great confederation of the Franks became formidable on the lower Rhine, and not less dangerous was that of the Allemanni on the upper part of that river.

See FRANKS: A. D. 253.

The Carpians and Sarmatians laid Mœsia waste; while the Persians plundered Syria, Cappadocia, and Cilicia. Gallienus, the emperor's son, whom Valerian had chosen for his colleague, and Aurelian, destined to succeed him in the empire, gained several victories over the Germanic tribes; while Valerian marched in person against the Scythians and Persians, who had invaded Asia. He gained a victory over the former in Anatolia, but, imprudently passing the Euphrates, he was surrounded by Sapor's army near Edessa … and was forced to surrender at discretion (A. D. 259).

See PERSIA: A. D. 226-627.

During nine years Valerian languished in hopeless captivity, the object of scorn and insult to his brutal conqueror, while no effort was made for his liberation by his unnatural son. Gallienus succeeded to the throne. … At the moment of his accession, the barbarians, encouraged by the captivity of Valerian, invaded the empire on all sides. Italy itself was invaded by the Germans, who advanced to Ravenna, but they were forced to retire by the emperor.

See ALEMANNI: A. D. 259.

{2717}

Gallienus, after this exertion, sunk into complete inactivity: his indolence roused a host of competitors for the empire in the different provinces, commonly called 'the thirty tyrants,' though the number of pretenders did not exceed 19. … Far the most remarkable of them was Odenatus, who assumed the purple at Palmyra, gained several great victories over the Persians, and besieged Sapor in Ctesiphon. … But this great man was murdered by some of his own family; he was succeeded by his wife, the celebrated Zenobia, who took the title of Queen of the East. Gallienus did not long survive him; he was murdered while besieging Aureolus, one of his rivals, in Mediolanum (Milan); but before his death he transmitted his rights to Claudius, a general of great reputation (A. D. 268). Most of the other tyrants had previously fallen in battle or by assassination. Marcus Aurelius Claudius, having conquered his only rival, Aureolus, marched against the Germans and Goths, whom he routed with great slaughter

See GOTHS: A. D. 268-270.

He then prepared to march against Zenobia, who had conquered Egypt; but a pestilence broke out in his army, and the emperor himself was one of its victims (A. D. 270). … His brother was elected emperor by acclamation; but in 17 days he so displeased the army, by attempting to revive the ancient discipline, that he was deposed and murdered. Aurelian, a native of Sirmium in Pannonia, was chosen emperor by the army; and the senate, well acquainted with his merits, joyfully confirmed the election. He made peace with the Goths, and led his army against the Germans, who had once more invaded Italy.

See ALEMANNI: A. D. 270.

Aurelian was at first defeated; but he soon retrieved his loss, and cut the whole of the barbarian army to pieces. His next victory was obtained over the Vandals, a new horde that had passed the Danube; and having thus secured the tranquility of Europe, he marched to rescue the eastern provinces from Zenobia," whom he vanquished and brought captive to Rome.

See PALMYRA.

This accomplished, the vigorous emperor proceeded to the suppression of a formidable revolt in Egypt, and then to the recovery of Gaul, Spain, and Britain, "which had now for thirteen years been the prey of different tyrants. A single campaign restored these provinces to the empire; and Aurelian, returning to Rome, was honoured with the most magnificent triumph that the city had ever beheld. … But he abandoned the province of Dacia to the barbarians, withdrawing all the Roman garrisons that had been stationed beyond the Danube. Aurelian's virtues were sullied by the sternness and severity that naturally belongs to a peasant and a soldier. His officers dreaded his inflexibility," and he was murdered, A. D. 275, by some of them who had been detected in peculations and who dreaded his wrath. The senate elected as his successor Marcus Claudius Tacitus, who died after a reign of seven months. Florian, a brother of Tacitus, was then chosen by the senate; but the Syrian army put forward a competitor in the person of its commander, Marcus Aurelius Probus, and Florian was presently slain by his own troops. "Probus, now undisputed master of the Empire, led his troops from Asia to Gaul, which was again devastated by the German tribes; he not only defeated the barbarians, but pursued them into their own country, where he gained greater advantages than any of his predecessors.

See GAUL: A. D. 277 and GERMANY: A. D. 277.

Thence he passed into Thrace, where he humbled the Goths; and, returning to Asia, he completely subdued the insurgent Isaurians, whose lands he divided among his veterans," and commanded peace on his own terms from the king of Persia. But even the power with which Probus wielded his army could not protect him from its licentiousness, and in a sudden mutiny (A. D. 282) he was slain. Carus, captain of the prætorian guards, was then raised to the throne by the army, the senate assenting. He repelled the Sarmatians and defeated the Persians, who had renewed hostilities; but he died, A. D. 283, while besieging Ctesiphon. His son Numerianus was chosen his successor; "but after a few months' reign, he was assassinated by Aper, his father-in-law and captain of his guards. The crime, however, was discovered, and the murderer put to death by the army. Dioclesian, said to have been originally a slave, was unanimously saluted Emperor by the army. He was proclaimed at Chalcedon, on the 17th of December, A. D. 284; an epoch that deserves to be remembered, as it marks the beginning of a new era, called 'the Era of Dioclesian,' or 'the Era of Martyrs,' which long prevailed in the church, and is still used by the Copts, the Abyssinians, and other African nations."

W. C. Taylor, Student's Manual of Ancient History, chapter 17, sections 6-7.

ALSO IN: E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapters 5-12 (volume 1).

ROME: A. D. 213. First collision with the Alemanni.

See ALEMANNI: A. D. 213.

ROME: A. D. 238. Siege of Aquileia by Maximin.

See ROME: A. D. 192-284.

ROME: A. D. 238-267. Naval incursions and ravages of the Goths in Greece and Asia Minor.

See GOTHS: A. D. 258-267.

ROME: A. D. 284-305. Reconstitution of the Empire by Diocletian. Its division and subdivision between two Augusti and two Cæsars. Abdication of Diocletian.

"The accession of Diocletian to power marks a new epoch in the history of the Roman empire. From this time the old names of the republic, the consuls, the tribunes, and the Senate itself, cease, even if still existing, to have any political significance. The government becomes avowedly a monarchical autocracy, and the officers by whom it is administered are simply the nominees of the despot on the throne. The empire of Rome is henceforth an Oriental sovereignty. Aurelian had already introduced the use of the Oriental diadem. The nobility of the empire derive their positions from the favor of the sovereign; the commons of the empire, who have long lost their political power, cease to enjoy even the name of citizens. The provinces are still administered under the imperial prefects by the magistrates and the assemblies of an earlier date, but the functions of both the one and the other are confined more strictly than ever to matters of police and finance. Hitherto, indeed, the Senate, however intrinsically weak, had found opportunities for putting forth its claims to authority. … The chosen of the legions had been for some time past the commander of an army, rather than the sovereign of the state. He had seldom quitted the camp, rarely or never presented himself in the capital. … The whole realm might split asunder at any moment into as many kingdoms as there were armies, unless the chiefs of the legions felt themselves controlled by the strength or genius of one more eminent than the rest. … {2718} The danger of disruption, thus far averted mainly by the awe which the name of Rome inspired, was becoming yearly more imminent, when Diocletian arose to re-establish the organic connection of the parts, and breathe a new life into the heart of the body politic. The jealous edict of Gallienus … had forbidden the senators to take service in the army, or to quit the limits of Italy. The degradation of that once illustrious order, which was thus rendered incapable of furnishing a candidate for the diadem, was completed by its indolent acquiescence in this disqualifying ordinance. The nobles of Rome relinquished all interest in affairs which they could no longer aspire to conduct. The emperors, on their part, ceased to regard them as a substantive power in the state; and in constructing his new imperial constitution Diocletian wholly overlooked their existence. … While he disregarded the possibility of opposition at Rome, he contrived a new check upon the rivalry of his distant lieutenants, by associating with himself three other chiefs, welded together by strict alliance into one imperial family, each of whom should take up his residence in a separate quarter of the empire, and combine with all the others in maintaining their common interest. His first step was to choose a single colleague in the person of a brave soldier of obscure origin, an Illyrian peasant, by name Maximianus, whom he invested with the title of Augustus in the year 286. The associated rulers assumed at the same time the fanciful epithets of Jovius and Herculius, auspicious names, which made them perhaps popular in the camps, where the commanding genius of the one and the laborious fortitude of the other were fully recognized. Maximianus was deputed to control the legions in Gaul, to make head against domestic sedition, as well as against the revolt of Carausius, a pretender to the purple in Britain, while Diocletian encountered the enemies or rivals who were now rising up in various quarters in the East.

See BRITAIN: A. D. 288-297.

His dangers still multiplied, and again the powers of the state were subdivided to meet them. In the year 292 Diocletian created two Cæsars; the one, Galerius, to act subordinately to himself in the East; the other, Constantius Chlorus, to divide the government of the western provinces with Maximian. The Cæsars were bound more closely to the Augusti by receiving their daughters in marriage; but though they acknowledged each a superior in his own half of the empire, and admitted a certain supremacy of Diocletian over all, yet each enjoyed kingly rule in his own territories, and each established a court and capital, as well as an army and a camp. Diocletian retained the wealthiest and most tranquil portion of the realm, and reigned in Nicomedia [see NICOMEDIA] over Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt; while he intrusted to the Cæsar Galerius, established at Sirmium, the more exposed provinces on the Danube. Maximian occupied Italy, the adjacent islands, and Africa, stationing himself, however, not in Rome, but at Milan. Constantius was required to defend the Rhenish frontier; and the martial provinces of Gaul, Spain, and Britain were given him to furnish the forces necessary for maintaining that important trust. The capital of the Western Cæsar was fixed at Treves. Inspired with a common interest, and controlled by the ascendency of Diocletian himself, all the emperors acted with vigor in their several provinces. Diocletian recovered Alexandria and quieted the revolt of Egypt.

See ALEXANDRIA: A. D. 296.

Maximian routed the unruly hordes of Maurentia, and overthrew a pretender to sovereignty in that distant quarter. Constantius discomfited an invading host of Alemanni, kept in check Carausius, who for a moment had seized upon Britain, and again wrested that province from Allectus, who had murdered and succeeded to him. Galerius brought the legions of Illyria to the defence of Syria against the Persians, and though once defeated on the plains of Carrhæ, at last reduced the enemy to submission.

See PERSIA: A. D. 226-627].

Thus victorious in every quarter, Diocletian celebrated the commencement of his twentieth year of power with a triumph at the ancient capital, and again taking leave of the imperial city, returned to his customary residence at Nicomedia. The illness with which he was attacked on his journey suggested or fixed his resolution to relieve himself from his cares, and on May 1, in the year 305, being then fifty-nine years of age, he performed the solemn act of abdication at Morgus, in Mæsia, the spot where he had first assumed the purple at the bidding of his soldiers. Strange to say, he did not renounce the object of his ambition alone. On the same day a similar scene was enacted by his colleague Maximian at Milan; but the abdication of Maximian was not, it is said, a spontaneous sacrifice, but imposed upon him by the influence or authority of his elder and greater colleague. Diocletian had established the principle of succession by which the supreme power was to descend. Having seen the completion of all his arrangements, and congratulated himself on the success, thus far, of his great political experiments, he crowned his career of moderation and self-restraint by strictly confining himself during the remainder of his life to the tranquil enjoyment of a private station. Retiring to the residence he had prepared for himself at Salona, he found occupation and amusement in the cultivation of his garden."

C. Merivale, General History of Rome, chapter 70.

ALSO IN: E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 13.

W. T. Arnold, The Roman System of Provincial Administration, chapter 4.

See, also, DIOCLETIAN.

ROME: A. D. 287. Insurrection of the Bagauds in Gaul.

See BAGAUDS; also, DEDITITIUS.

ROME: A. D. 303-305. The persecution of Christians under Diocletian.

"Dreams concerning the overthrow of the Empire had long been cast into the forms of prophecies amongst the Christians. … There were some to repeat the predictions and to count the proofs of overthrow impending upon the Empire. But there were more, far more, to desire its preservation. Many even laboured for it. The number of those holding offices of distinction at the courts and in the armies implies the activity of a still larger number in inferior stations. … Never, on the other hand, had the generality of Christians been the objects of deeper or more bitter suspicions. … By the lower orders, they would be hated as conspiring against the customs of their province or the glories of their race. By men of position and of education, they would be despised as opposing every interest of learning, of property, and of rank. Darker still were the sentiments of the sovereigns. {2719} By them the Christians were scorned as unruly subjects, building temples without authority, appointing priests without license, while they lived and died for principles the most adverse to the laws and to the rulers of the Empire. … Everywhere they were advancing. Everywhere they met with reviving foes. At the head of these stood the Cæsar, afterwards the Emperor Galerius. He who had been a herdsman of Dacia was of the stamp to become a wanton ruler. He showed his temper in his treatment of the Heathen. He showed it still more clearly in his hostility towards the Christians. … He turned to Diocletian. The elder Emperor was in the mood to hear his vindictive son-in-law. Already had Diocletian fulminated his edicts against the Christians. Once it was because his priests declared them to be denounced in an oracle from Apollo, as opposing the worship of that deity. At another time, it was because his soothsayers complained of the presence of his Christian attendants as interfering with the omens on which the Heathen depended. Diocletian was superstitious. But he yielded less to his superstition as a man than to his imperiousness as a sovereign, when he ordered that all employed in the imperial service should take part in the public sacrifices under pain of scourging and dismissal. … At this crisis he was accosted by Galerius. Imperious as he was, Diocletian was still circumspect. … Galerius urged instant suppression. 'The world,' replied his father-in-law, 'will be thrown into confusion, if we attack the Christians.' But Galerius insisted. Not all the caution of the elder Emperor was proof against the passions thus excited by his son-in-law. The wives of Diocletian and Galerius, both said to have been Christians, interceded in vain. Without consulting the other sovereigns, it was determined between Diocletian and Galerius to sound the alarum of persecution throughout their realms. Never had persecution begun more fearfully. Without a note of warning, the Christians of Nicomedia were startled, one morning, by the sack and demolition of their church. … Not until the next day, however, was there any formal declaration of hostilities. An edict then appeared commanding instant and terrible proceedings against the Christians. Their churches were to be razed. Their Scriptures were to be destroyed. They themselves were to be deprived of their estates and offices. … Some days or weeks, crowded with resistance as well as suffering, went by. Suddenly a fire broke out in the palace at Nicomedia. It was of course laid at the charge of the Christians. … Some movements occurring in the eastern provinces were also ascribed to Christian machinations. … The Empresses, suspected of sharing the faith of the sufferers, were compelled to offer public sacrifice. Fiercer assaults ensued. A second edict from the palace ordered the arrest of the Christian priests. A third commanded that the prisoners should be forced to sacrifice according to the Heathen ritual under pain of torture. When the dungeons were filled, and the racks within them were busy with their horrid work, a fourth edict, more searching and more pitiless than any, was published. By this the proper officers were directed to arrest every Christian whom they could discover, and bring him to one of the Heathen temples. … Letters were despatched to demand the co-operation of the Emperor Maximian and the Cæsar Constantius. The latter, it is said, refused; yet there were no limits that could be set to the persecution by any one of the sovereigns. … None suffered more than the Christians in Britain. … The intensity of the persecution was in no degree diminished by the extent over which it spread. … Some were thrown into dungeons to renounce their faith or to die amidst the agonies of which they had no fear. Long trains of those who survived imprisonment were sent across the country or beyond the sea to labour like brutes in the public mines. In many cities the streets must have been literally blocked up with the stakes and scaffolds where death was dealt alike to men and women and little children. It mattered nothing of what rank the victims were. The poorest slave and the first officer of the imperial treasury were massacred with equal savageness. … The memory of man embraces no such strife, if that can be called a strife in which there was but one side armed, but one side slain."

S. Eliot, History of the Early Christians, book 3, chapter 10 (volume 1).

ALSO IN: A. Carr, The Church and the Roman Empire, chapter 2.

G. Uhlhorn, The Conflict of Christianity with Heathenism, book 3, chapter 1.

ROME: A. D. 305-323. The wars of Constantine and his rivals. His triumph. His reunion of the Empire.

On the abdication of Diocletian and Maximian, Constantius and Galerius, who had previously held the subordinate rank of Cæsars, succeeded to the superior throne, as Augusti. A nephew of Galerius, named Maximin, and one Severus, who was his favorite, were then appointed Cæsars, to the exclusion of Constantine, son of Constantius, and Maxentius, son of Maximian, who might have naturally expected the elevation. Little more than a year afterwards, Constantius died, in Britain, and Constantine was proclaimed Augustus and Emperor, in his place, by the armies of the West. Galerius had not courage to oppose this military election, except so far as to withhold from Constantine the supreme rank of Augustus, which he conferred on his creature, Severus. Constantine acquiesced, for the moment, and contented himself with the name of Cæsar, while events and his own prudence were preparing for him a far greater elevation. In October, 306, there was a successful rising at Rome against Severus, Maxentius was raised to the throne by the voice of the feeble senate and the people, and his father, Maximian, the abdicated monarch, came out of his retirement to resume the purple, in association at first, but afterwards in rivalry with his son. Severus was besieged at Ravenna and, having surrendered, was condemned to death. Galerius undertook to avenge his death by invading Italy, but retreated ignominiously. Thereupon he invested his friend Licinius with the emblems and the rank of the deceased Severus. The Roman world had then six emperors—each claiming the great title of "Augustus": Galerius, Licinius, and Maximin in the East (including Africa), making common cause against Maximian, Maxentius and Constantine in the West. The first, in these combinations, to fall out, were the father and son, Maximian and Maxentius, both claiming authority in Italy. The old emperor appealed to his former army and it declared against him. {2720} He fled, taking shelter, first, with his enemy Galerius, but soon repairing to the court of Constantine, who had married his daughter Fausta. A little later, the dissatisfied and restless old man conspired to dethrone his son-in-law and was put to death. The next year (May, A. D. 311) Galerius died at Nicomedia, and his dominions were divided between Licinius and Maximin. The combinations were now changed, and Constantine and Licinius entered into an alliance against Maxentius and Maximin. Rome and Italy had wearied by this time of Maxentius, who was both vicious and tyrannical, and invited Constantine to deliver them. He responded by a bold invasion of Italy, with a small army of but 40,000 men; defeated the greater army of Maxentius at Turin; occupied the imperial city of Milan; took Verona, after a siege and a desperate battle fought outside its walls, and finished his antagonist in a third encounter (October 28, A. D. 312), at Saxa Rubra, within nine miles of Rome. Maxentius perished in the flight from this decisive field and Constantine possessed his dominions. In the next year, Maximin, rashly venturing to attack Licinius, was defeated near Heraclea, on the Propontis, and died soon afterwards. The six emperors of the year 308 were now (A. D. 313) reduced to two, and the friendship between them was ostentatious. But it endured little longer than a single year. Licinius was accused of conspiring against Constantine, and the latter declared war. The first battle was fought near Cibalis, in Pannonia, the second on the plain of Mardia, in Thrace, and Constantine was the victor in both. Licinius sued for peace and obtained it (December, A. D. 315) by the cession of all his dominion in Europe, except Thrace. For eight years, Constantine was contented with the great empire he then possessed. In 323 he determined to grasp the entire Roman world. Licinius opposed him with a vigor unexpected and the war was prepared for on a mighty scale. It was practically decided by the first great battle, at Hadrianople, on the 3d of July, 323. Licinius, defeated, took refuge in Byzantium, which Constantine besieged. Escaping from Byzantium into Asia, Licinius fought once more at Chrysopolis and then yielded to his fate. He died soon after. The Roman empire was again united and Constantine was its single lord.

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 14.

ALSO IN: E. L. Cutts, Constantine the Great, chapters 7-22.

ROME: A. D. 306. Constantine's defeat of the Franks.

See FRANKS: A. D. 306.

ROME: A. D. 313. Constantine's Edict of Milan. Declared toleration of Christianity.

After the extension of the sovereignty of Constantine over the Italian provinces as well as Gaul and the West, he went, in January, A. D. 313, to Milan, and there held a conference with Licinius, his eastern colleague in the empire. One of the results of that conference was the famous Edict of Milan, which recognized Christianity and admitted it to a footing of equal toleration with the paganisms of the empire—in terms as follows: "Wherefore, as I, Constantine Augustus, and I, Licinius Augustus, came under favourable auspices to Milan, and took under consideration all affairs that pertained to the public benefit and welfare, these things among the rest appeared to us to be most advantageous and profitable to all. We have resolved among the first things to ordain, those matters by which reverence and worship to the Deity might be exhibited. That is, how we may grant likewise to the Christians, and to all, the free choice to follow that mode of worship which they may wish. That whatsoever divinity and celestial power may exist may be propitious to us, and to all that live under our government. Therefore, we have decreed the following ordinance as our will, with a salutary and most correct intention, that no freedom at all shall be refused to Christians, to follow or to keep their observances or worship. But that to each one power be granted to devote his mind to that worship which he may think adapted to himself. That the Deity may in all things exhibit to us His accustomed favour and kindness. … And this we further decree, with respect to the Christians, that the places in which they were formerly accustomed to assemble, concerning which also we formerly wrote to your fidelity, in a different form, that if any persons have purchased these, either from our treasurer, or from any other one, these shall restore them to the Christians, without money and without demanding any price. … They who as we have said restore them without valuation and price may expect their indemnity from our munificence and liberality."

Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, book 10, chapter 5.

ALSO IN: P. Schaff, Progress of Religious Freedom, chapter 2.

ROME: A. D. 318-325. The Arian Controversy and the Council of Nicæa.

See ARIANISM; and NICÆA: A. D. 325.

ROME: A. D. 323. The conversion of Constantine. His Christianity. His character.

"The alleged supernatural conversion of Constantine has afforded a subject of doubt and debate from that age to the present. Up to the date of his war against Maxentius, the Emperor believed, like his father, in one god, whom he represented to himself, not with the attributes of Jupiter, best and greatest, father of gods and men, but under the form of Apollo, with the attributes of the glorified youth of manhood, the god of light and life. … His conversion to Christianity took place at the period of the war with Maxentius. The chief contemporary authorities on the subject are Lactantius and Eusebius. Lactantius, an African by birth, was a rhetorician (or, as we should call him, professor) at Nicomedia, of such eminence that Constantine entrusted to him the education of his eldest son, Crispus. Writing before the death of Licinius, i. e. before the year 314 A. D., or within two, or at most three, years of the event, Lactantius says, 'Constantine was admonished in his sleep to mark the celestial sign of God on the shields, and so to engage in the battle. He did as he was commanded and marked the name of Christ on the shields by the letter X drawn across them, with the top circumflexed. Armed with this sign his troops proceed,' etc. Eusebius, Bishop of Cæsarea, the historian of the early Church, the most learned Christian of his time, was, after Constantine's conquest of the East, much about the court, in the confidence of the Emperor, and one of his chief advisers in ecclesiastical matters. In his 'Life of Constantine', published twenty-six years after the Emperor's death, he gives us an interesting account of the moral process of the Emperor's conversion. {2721} Reflecting on the approaching contest with Maxentius, and hearing of the extraordinary rites by which he was endeavouring to win the favour of the gods, 'being convinced that he needed some more powerful aid than his military forces could afford him, on account of the wicked and magical enchantments which were so diligently practised by the tyrant, he began to seek for divine assistance. … And while he was thus praying with fervent entreaty, a most marvellous sign appeared to him from heaven, the account of which it might have been difficult to receive with credit, had it been related by any other person. But since the victorious emperor himself long afterwards declared it to the writer of this history, when he was honoured with his acquaintance and society, and confirmed his statement by an oath, who could hesitate to credit the relation, especially since the testimony of after time has established its truth? He said that at mid-day, when the sun was beginning to decline, he saw, with his own eyes, the trophy of a cross of light in the heavens, above the sun, and bearing the inscription, "Conquer by this." At this sight he himself was struck with amazement, and his whole army also, which happened to be following him on some expedition, and witnessed the miracle. He said, moreover, that he doubted within himself what the import of this apparition could be. And while he continued to ponder and reason on its meaning, night imperceptibly drew on; and in his sleep the Christ of God appeared to him with the same sign which he had seen in the heavens, and commanded him to procure a standard made in the likeness of that sign, and to use it as a safeguard in all engagements with his enemies.'" The standard which is said to have had this origin was the famous Labarum.

E. L. Cutts, Constantine the Great, chapter 11.

"He [Constantine] was not lacking in susceptibility to certain religious impressions; he acknowledged the peculiar providence of God in the manner in which he had been delivered from dangers, made victorious over all his pagan adversaries, and finally rendered master of the Roman world. It flattered his vanity to be considered the favourite of God, and his destined instrument to destroy the empire of the evil spirits (the heathen deities). The Christians belonging to court were certainly not wanting on their part to confirm him in this persuasion. … Constantine must indeed have been conscious that he was striving not so much for the cause of God as for the gratification of his own ambition and love of power; and that such acts of perfidy, mean revenge, or despotic jealousy, as occurred in his political course, did not well befit an instrument and servant of God, such as he claimed to be considered. … Even Eusebius, one of the best among the bishops at his court, is so dazzled by what the emperor had achieved for the outward extension and splendour of the church, as to be capable of tracing to the purest motives of a servant of God all the acts which a love of power that would not brook a rival had, at the expense of truth and humanity, put into the heart of the emperor in the war against Licinius. … Bishops in immediate attendance on the emperor so far forgot indeed to what master they belonged, that, at the celebration of the third decennium of his reign (the tricennalia), one of them congratulated him as constituted by God the ruler over all in the present world, and destined to reign with the Son of God in the world to come, The feelings of Constantine himself were shocked at such a parallel."

A. Neander, General History of the Christian Religion and Church, period 2, section. 1, A.

"As he approached the East, he [Constantine] adopted oriental manners; he affected the gorgeous purple of the monarchs of Persia; he decorated his head with false hair of different colours, and with a diadem covered with pearls and gems. He substituted flowing silken robes, embroidered with flowers, for the austere garb of Rome, or the unadorned purple of the first Roman emperors. He filled his palace with eunuchs, and lent an ear to their perfidious calumnies; he became the instrument of their base intrigues, their cupidity, and their jealousy. He multiplied spies, and subjected the palace and the empire, alike, to a suspicious police. He lavished the wealth of Rome on the sterile pomp of stately buildings. … He poured out the best and noblest blood in torrents, more especially of those nearly connected with himself. The most illustrious victim of his tyranny was Crispus, his son by his first wife, whom he had made the partner of his empire, and the commander of his armies. … In a palace which he had made a desert, the murderer of his father-in-law, his brothers-in-law, his sister, his wife, his son, and his nephew, must have felt the stings of remorse, if hypocritical priests and courtier bishops had not lulled his conscience to rest. We still possess the panegyric in which they represent him as a favourite of Heaven, a saint worthy of our highest veneration; we have also several laws by which Constantine atoned for all his crimes, in the eyes of the priests, by heaping boundless favours on the church. The gifts he bestowed on it, the immunities he granted to persons and to property connected with it, soon directed ambition entirely to ecclesiastical dignities. The men who had so lately been candidates for the honours of martyrdom, now found themselves depositaries of the greatest wealth and the highest power. How was it possible that their characters should not undergo a total change?"

J. C. L. de Sismondi, History of the Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 4 (volume 1).

See, also, CHRISTIANITY: A. D. 312-337.

ROME: A. D. 330. Transference of the capital of the Empire to Byzantium (Constantinople).

See CONSTANTINOPLE A. D. 330.

ROME: A. D. 337-361. Redivision of the Empire. Civil wars between the sons of Constantine and their successors. Elevation of Julian to the throne.

Before the death of Constantine, "his three sons, Constantine, Constantius, and Constans, had already been successively raised to the rank of Cæsar about the tenth, twentieth, and thirtieth years of his reign. The royal family contained also two other young princes, sons of Dalmatius, one of the half-brothers of Constantine; the elder of these nephews of the Emperor was called Dalmatius, after his father, the other Hanniballianus. … Constantine shared—not the Empire, but—the imperial power among his three sons. The eldest, Constantine, was to hold the first rank among the three Augusti, and to take the western Gallic provinces under his especial administration; Constantius was to take the east, viz., Asia, Syria, and Egypt; Constans was to take the central portion of the Empire, Italy, Africa, and Western Illyricum."

E. L. Cutts, Constantine the Great, chapter 33.

{2722}

The father of these three princes was no sooner dead (A. D. 337) than they made haste to rid themselves of all the possible rivals in a family which seemed too numerous for peace. Two uncles and seven cousins—including Dalmatius and Hannibalianus—with other connections by marriage and otherwise, were quickly put out of the way under one and another pretence and with more or less mockery of legal forms. The three brothers then divided the provinces between them on much the same plan as before; but Constantine, the eldest, now reigned in the new capital of his father, which bore his name. There was peace between them for three years. It was broken by Constantine, who demanded the surrender to him of a part of the dominions of Constans. War ensued and Constantine was killed in one of the earliest engagements of it. Constans took possession of his dominions, refusing any share of them to Constantius, and reigned ten years longer, when he was destroyed, A. D. 350, by a conspiracy in Gaul, which raised to his throne one Magnentius, a soldier of barbarian extraction. Magnentius was acknowledged in Gaul and Italy; but the troops in Illyricum invested their own general, Vetranio, with the purple. Constantius, in the East, now roused himself to oppose these rebellions, and did so with success. Vetranio, an aged man, was intimidated by artful measures and driven to surrender his unfamiliar crown. Magnentius advanced boldly to meet an enemy whom he despised, and was defeated in a great battle fought September 21, A. D. 351, at Mursa (Essek, in modern Hungary, on the Drave). Retreating to Italy, and from Italy to Gaul, he maintained the war for another year, but slew himself finally in despair and the empire had a single ruler, once more. The sole emperor, Constantius, now found his burden of power too great, and sought to share it. Two young nephews had been permitted to live, when the massacre of the house of Constantine occurred, and he turned to these. He raised the elder, Gallus, to the rank of Cæsar, and gave him the government of the præfecture of the East. But Gallus conducted himself like a Nero and was disgraced and executed in little more than three years. The younger nephew, Julian, escaped his brother's fate by great prudence of behavior and by the friendship of the Empress Eusebia. In 355, he, in turn, was made Cæsar and sent into Gaul. Distinguishing himself there in several campaigns against the Germans (see GAUL: A. D. 355-361), he provoked the jealousy of Constantius and of the eunuchs who ruled the imperial court. To strip him of troops, four Gallic legions were ordered to the East, for the Persian war. They rose in revolt, at Paris, proclaimed Julian emperor and forced him to assume the dangerous title. He promptly sent an embassy to Constantius asking the recognition and confirmation of this procedure; but his overtures were rejected with disdain. He then declared war, and conducted an extraordinary expedition into Illyricum, through the Black Forest and down the Danube, occupying Sirmium and seizing the Balkan passes before he was known to have left Gaul. But the civil war so vigorously opened was suddenly arrested at this stage by the death of Constantius (A. D. 361), and Julian became sole emperor without more dispute. He renounced Christianity and is known in history as Julian the Apostate.

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapters 18-22.

ROME: A. D. 338-359. Wars of Constantius with the Persians.

See PERSIA: A. D. 226-627.

ROME: A. D. 350-361. Extensive abandonment of Gaul to the Germans. Its recovery by Julian.

See GAUL: A. D. 355-361.

ROME: A. D. 361-363. Julian and the Pagan revival.

"Heathenism still possessed a latent power greater than those supposed who persuaded the Emperors that now it could be easily extirpated. The state of affairs in the West differed from that in the East. In the West it was principally the Roman aristocracy, who with few exceptions still adhered to their ancient religion, and with them the great mass of the people. In the East, on the contrary, Christianity had made much more progress among the masses, and a real aristocracy could scarcely be said to exist. In its stead there was an aristocracy of learning, whose hostility was far more dangerous to Christianity than the aversion of the Roman nobility. The youth still thronged to the ancient and illustrious schools of Miletus, Ephesus, Nicomedia, Antioch, and above all Athens, and the teachers in these schools were almost without exception heathen. … There the ancient heathen spirit was imbibed, and with it a contempt for barbarian Christianity. The doctrinal strife in the Christian Church was held up to ridicule, and, alas! with too much reason. For, according to the Emperor's favor and caprice, one doctrine stood for orthodoxy to-day and another to-morrow. To-day it was decreed that Christ was of the same essence with the Father, and all who refused to acknowledge this were deposed and exiled. Tomorrow the court theology had swung round, it was decreed that Christ was a created being, and now it was the turn of the other party to go into banishment. The educated heathen thought themselves elevated far above all this in their classic culture. With what secret anger they beheld the way in which the temples were laid waste, the works of art broken to pieces, the memorials of an age of greatness destroyed, and all in favor of a barbarian religion destitute of culture. The old rude forms of Heathenism, indeed, they themselves did not desire, but the refined Heathenism of the Neoplatonic school seemed to them not merely the equal but the superior of Christianity. … These were the sources of the re-action against Christianity. Their spirit was embodied in Julian. In him it ascended for the last time the imperial throne, and made the final attempt to stop the triumphal progress of Christianity. But it succeeded only in giving to the world irresistible evidence that the sceptre of the spirit of Antiquity was forever broken. … What influenced Julian was chiefly enthusiasm for Greek culture. Even in a religious aspect Polytheism seemed to him superior to Monotheism, because more philosophic. Neoplatonism filled the whole soul of the young enthusiast, and seemed to him to comprehend all the culture of the ancient world in a unified system. But of course his vanity had a great share in the matter, for he naturally received the most devoted homage among the Hellenists, and his rhetorical friends did not stint their flattery. … He made his entry … [into Constantinople) as a declared heathen. Although at the beginning of his campaign he had secretly sacrificed to Bellona, yet he had attended the church in Vienne. {2723} But on the march he put an end to all ambiguity, and publicly offered sacrifices to the ancient gods. The Roman Empire once more had a heathen Emperor. At first all was joy; for as universally as Constantius was hated, Julian was welcomed as a deliverer. Even the Christians joined in this rejoicing. They too had found the arbitrary government of the last few years hard enough to bear. And if some who looked deeper began to feel anxiety, they consoled themselves by the reflection that even a heathen Emperor could not injure the Church so much as a Christian Emperor who used his power in promoting whatever seemed to him at the time to be orthodoxy in the dogmatic controversies of the age. And Julian proclaimed, not the suppression of Christianity, but only complete religious liberty. He himself intended to be a heathen, but no Christian should be disturbed in his faith. Julian was certainly thoroughly in earnest in this. To be a persecutor of the Church, was the last thing he would have thought of. Besides, he was much too fully persuaded of the untruth of Christianity and the truth of Heathenism to persecute. Julian was an enthusiast, like all the rhetoricians and philosophers who surrounded him. He regarded himself as called by a divine voice to the great work of restoring Heathenism, and this was from the beginning avowedly his object. And he was no less firmly convinced that this restoration would work itself out without any use of force; as soon as free scope was given to Heathenism it would, by its own powers, overcome Christianity. … The Emperor himself was evidently in all respects a heathen from sincere conviction. In this regard at least he was honest and no hypocrite. The flagrant voluptuousness, which had corrupted the court, was banished, and a large number of useless officials dismissed. The life of the court was to be simple, austere, and pure. Men had never before seen an Emperor who conducted himself with such simplicity, whose table was so economically supplied, and who knew no other employments than hard work, and devoted worship of the gods. A temple was built in the palace, and there Julian offered a daily sacrifice. Often he might be seen serving at the sacrifice himself, carrying the wood and plunging the knife into the victim with his own hand. He remembered every festival which should be celebrated, and knew how to observe the whole half-forgotten ritual most punctiliously. He was equally zealous in performing the duties of his office as Pontifex Maximus. Everywhere he revived the ancient worship which had fallen into neglect. Here a closed temple was re-opened, there a ruined shrine restored, images of the gods were set up again, and festivals which had ceased to be celebrated, were restored. … Soon conversions became plentiful; governors, officials, soldiers, made themselves proficient in the ancient cultus; and even a bishop, Pegasius of New Ilium, whom Julian had previously learned to know as a secret friend of the gods, when he had heen the Emperor's guide to the classic sites of Troy, changed his religion, and from a Christian bishop became a heathen high-priest. … The dream of a restoration of Heathenism nevertheless soon began to prove itself a dream. Though now surrounded by heathen only, Julian could not help feeling that he was really isolated in their midst. He himself was naturally a mystic, and lived in his ideals. His Heathenism was one purified by poetic feeling. But there was little or nothing of this to be found actually existing. His heathen friends were courtiers, who agreed with him without inward conviction. … He was far too serious and severely moral for their tastes. They preferred the theatre to the temple, they liked amusement best, and found the daily attendance at worship and the monotonous ceremonies and sacrifices very dull. A measurably tolerant Christian Emperor would doubtless have suited them better than this enthusiastically pious heathen. Blinded as Julian was by his ideal views, he soon could not escape the knowledge that things were not going well. If Heathenism was to revive, it must receive new life within. The restoration must be also a reformation. Strangely enough Julian felt compelled to borrow from Christianity the ways and means for such a reformation. The heathen priests, like the Christian, were to instruct the people, and exhort them to holy living. The heathen, like the Christians, were to care for the poor. … While new strength was thus to be infused into Heathenism, other measures were adopted to weaken Christianity. An imperial edict, June 17, A. D. 362, forbade the Christians to act as teachers of the national literature, the ancient classics. It was, the Emperor explained, a contradiction for Christians to expound Homer, Thucydides, or Demosthenes, when they regarded them as godless men and aliens. He would not compel them to change their convictions, but also he could not permit the ancient writers to be expounded by those who took them to task for impiety. … This, of course, was not a persecution, if the use of force alone makes a persecution, yet it was a persecution, and in a sense a worse one than any which went before. Julian tried to deprive the Christians of that which should be common to all men,—education. … Nevertheless he had to confess to himself that the restoration of Heathenism was making no progress worth speaking of. … He spent his whole strength, he sacrificed himself, he lived only for the Empire over which Providence had made him lord, and yet found himself alone in his endeavor. Even his heathen friends, the philosophers and rhetoricians, kept at a distance. … With such thoughts as these, Julian journeyed to Antioch, in Syria, in order to make preparations there for the great campaign he purposed to make against the Persians. There new disappointments awaited him. He found the shrines of his gods forsaken and desolate. … The temple of Apollo was restored with the greatest splendor. Julian went there to offer a sacrifice to the god. He expected to find a multitude of worshippers, but no one even brought oil for a lamp or incense to burn in honor of the deity. Only an old man approached to sacrifice a goose. … Shortly afterwards, the newly restored temple burned down in the night. Now the Emperor's wrath knew no bounds. He ascribed the guilt to the Christians; and although the temple, as is probable, caught fire through the fault of a heathen philosopher, who carried a dedicatory lamp about in it without due precautions, many Christians were arrested and tortured. The Church had its martyrs once more; and Julian, discontented with himself and the whole world besides, advanced to new measures. {2724} The cathedral of Antioch was closed and its property confiscated. Julian decreed that the Christians, whose God had forbidden them to kill, should not be intrusted with any office with which judicial functions were connected. … Julian himself became more and more restless. He hurried from temple to temple, brought sacrifice after sacrifice; he knelt for hours before his gods and covered their statues with kisses. Then at night he sat in the silence at his writing-table, and gave vent to his bitterness and disgust with every thing. Then he wrote his works full of brilliant wit, thought out and expressed with Greek refinement, but full of bitterest hatred especially against the Galileans and their Carpenter's Son. … Finally, his immense preparations for the campaign against the Persians were finished. Julian started, after finally setting over the Antiochians a wretch as governor, with the remark that the man did not deserve to be a governor, but they deserved to be governed by such a one."

G. Uhlhorn, The Conflict of Christianity with Heathenism, book 3, chapter 3.

ALSO IN: G. H. Rendall. Julian the Emperor.

B. L. Gildersleeve, The Emperor Julian (Essays and Studies, pages 355-400).

Gregory Nazianzen, Invectives against Julian, and Libanius, Funeral Oration upon Julian, translated by C. W. King.

ROME: A. D. 363. The Persian expedition of Julian. His death. Jovian made Emperor by the retreating army.

See PERSIA: A. D. 226-627.

ROME: A. D. 363-379. Christianity reascendant. Secret hostility of Paganism. Reign of Valentinian and Valens. Approach of the Huns. The struggle with the Goths. Elevation of Theodosius to the throne.

When Julian's successor, Jovian, "who did not reign long enough to lead back to Constantinople the army which he had marched from the banks of the Tigris, made public profession of Christianity, he, at the same time, displaced a great number of brave officers and able functionaries, whom Julian had promoted in proportion to their zeal for paganism. From that period, up to the fall of the empire, a hostile sect, which regarded itself as unjustly stripped of its ancient honours, invoked the vengeance of the gods on the heads of the government, exulted in the public calamities, and probably hastened them by its intrigues, though inextricably involved in the common ruin. The pagan faith, which was not attached to a body of doctrine, nor supported by a corporation of priests, nor heightened by the fervour of novelty, scarcely ever displayed itself in open revolt, or dared the perils of martyrdom; but pagans still occupied the foremost rank in letters:—the orators, the philosophers (or, as they were otherwise called, sophists), the historians, belonged, almost without an exception, to the ancient religion. It still kept possession of the most illustrious schools, especially those of Athens and Alexandria; the majority of the Roman senate were still attached to it; and in the breasts of the common people, particularly the rural population, it maintained its power for several centuries, branded, however, with the name of magic. … Less than eight months after his elevation to the throne, on the 17th of February, 364, Jovian died in a small town of Galatia. After the expiration of ten days, the army which he was leading home from Persia, at a solemn assembly held at Nice, in Bithynia, chose as his successor the son of a captain from a little village of Pannonia, the count Valentinian, whom his valour and bodily prowess had raised to one of the highest posts of the army. … Spite of his savage rudeness, and the furious violence of his temper, the Roman empire found in him an able chief at the moment of its greatest need. Unhappily, the extent of the empire required, at least, two rulers. The army felt this, and demanded a second. … Valentinian … chose his brother. Valens, with whom he shared his power, had the weak, timid, and cruel character which ordinarily distinguishes cowards. Valentinian, born in the West, … reserved the government of it to himself. He ceded to his brother a part of Illyricum on the Danube, and the whole of the East. He established universal toleration by law, and took no part in the sectarian controversies which divided Christendom. Valens adopted the Arian faith, and persecuted the orthodox party. The finances of the empire demanded a reform, which neither of the emperors was in a condition to undertake. They wanted money, and they were ignorant where to seek the long exhausted sources of public wealth. … Vast provinces in the interior were deserted; enlistments daily became more scanty and difficult; the magistrates of the 'curiæ' or municipalities, who were responsible both for the contributions and the levies of their respective towns, sought by a thousand subterfuges to escape the perilous honour of the magistrature. …

See CURIA, MUNICIPAL, OF THE LATER ROMAN EMPIRE.

During the twelve years that Valentinian reigned over the West (A. D. 364-376), he redeemed his cruelties by several brilliant victories. …

See ALEMANNI: A. D. 365-367.

Valentinian had undertaken the defence of Gaul in person, and generally resided at Treves, then the capital of that vast prefecture; but at the time he was thus occupied, invasions not less formidable had devastated the other provinces of the West. …

See BRITAIN. A. D. 367-370.

At this period Valens reigned over the Greeks, whose language he did not understand (A. D. 364-378). His eastern frontier was menaced by the Persians, his northern by the Goths. … Armenia and Iberia became subject to Persia; but as the people of both these countries were Christian, they remained faithful to the interests of Rome, though conquered by her enemy. … The dominion of the Goths extended along the shores of the Danube and the Black Sea, and thirty years had elapsed since they had made any incursion into the Roman territory. But during that period they had gone on increasing in greatness and in power. … Spite of the formidable neighbourhood of the Goths and the Persians—spite of the cowardice and the incapacity of Valens—the East had remained at peace, protected by the mere name of Valentinian, whose military talents, promptitude, and severity were known to all the barbarian tribes. But the career of this remarkable man, so dreaded by his enemies and by his subjects, had now reached its term." He died in a fit of rage, from the bursting of a blood-vessel in his chest, November 17, A. D. 375. "His two sons,—Gratian, who was scarcely come to manhood, and Valentinian, still a child,—shared the West between them. … {2725} Never, however, was the empire in greater need of an able and vigorous head. The entire nation of the Huns, abandoning to the Sienpi its ancient pastures bordering on China, had traversed the whole north of Asia by a march of 1,300 leagues." The Goths, overwhelmed and flying before them, begged permission to cross the Danube and take refuge in Mœsia and Thrace. They were permitted to do so; but such extortions and outrages were practiced on them, at the same time, that they were exasperated to a passionate hatred. This bore fruit in a general rising in 377. Two years of war ensued, marked by two great battles, that of Ad Salices, or The Willows, which neither side could fully claim, and that of Adrianople, August 9, 378, in which Valens perished, and more than 60,000 of his soldiers fell.